Citing data from J.D. Power, Car and Driver reported that EVs now command 1.9 percent of the market, while manuals are a mere 1.1 percent.

There are still more manuals on the market, too, Car and Driver notes. Right now, 40 models are offered with a manual transmission compared to 16 EV choices. Often, the manual is an entry-level option on economy cars or as options on higher-end, sporty models. Increasingly, it's the latter sorts that get the transmission option.

In the quick maintenance business, there's a lot of talk about the "do-it-for-me" economy that drives customers to shops. In this case, it's the "shift-it-for-me" culture.

The decline of manuals has been in the works for years now. Writing in 2018 for Cnet Road Show, Brian Cooley said the United States is a bit of an outlier in its preference for automatics. He wrote that the wealth of the American market, relative to other countries, makes the cost for an auto and a manual about the same in most cars. There are fewer Americans who can operate a manual and, finally, Cooley wrote that technology has made automatics about as efficient as manuals.